National Democratic Party's assets are also ordered liquidated; Mubarak, whose health is failing, likely moved to military hospital.

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An Egyptian court on Saturday ordered the dissolution of former president Hosni
Mubarak’s political party, meeting a demand of the prodemocracy movement whose
protests ended his 30-year authoritarian rule.

The disbanding of the
National Democratic Party (NDP) was likely to further appease protesters, who
had called off fresh demonstrations after the military council that now rules
Egypt ordered Mubarak detained earlier this week for questioning about
corruption allegations.

The NDP had dominated Egyptian politics since it
was founded by Mubarak’s predecessor, Anwar Sadat, in 1978.

For many in
Egypt, it epitomized the graft and abuse of power that helped ignite the
protests that forced Mubarak to quit in February.

“It’s illogical for any
instruments of the regime to remain, now that the regime itself has fallen,” the
High Administrative Court said in a statement. The court also ordered the
liquidation of NDP assets, with the funds to be returned to the state because,
the statement said, “this money is actually the money of the
people.”

Mubarak was taken to a military hospital near Cairo on Saturday,
three days after his arrest on corruption charges, the Egyptian newspaper Al-
Masry Al-Youm reported on its website. The former president was under heavy
guard at the International Medical Center of the Armed Forces, the website
reported, and his heart condition is not considered life-threatening. Saturday
marked Mubarak’s first return to greater Cairo since stepping down in
February.

Mubarak was admitted to a hospital in Sharm e-Sheikh on
Tuesday, suffering from an unspecified ailment, shortly after he was questioned.
On Friday, prosecutors ordered him moved to a military hospital until he is well
enough to be interrogated again.

Political analysts described the NDP’s
dissolution as an important step toward a multi-party system in Egypt, which is
to elect a new parliament and then a president later this year.

“All the
central powers in Egypt of the Mubarak regime, all of them, were under the
umbrella of the NDP,” said Nabil Abdel Fattah of the Al- Ahram Center for
Political and Strategic Studies. He said the party had a vast network extending
into villages and city neighborhoods that could be used to mobilize people in
elections.

“I think its infrastructure was very powerful,” Abdel Fattah
said. “The NDP also had huge money in banks, not just from membership fees, but
I think also from businessmen who financed the NDP. The money came from many
sources.”

Many of the party’s senior officials have been arrested on
graft and other charges and are now in Cairo’s Torah prison.

Mubarak is
accused of abusing power, embezzling funds and being responsible for deaths of
some protesters.

He has denied any wrongdoing, but many Egyptians see him
as a repressive autocrat whose lengthy rule benefited only a few, while
perpetuating the grinding poverty of the majority of the country’s 80 million
people.

The Obama administration said last week it was “deeply concerned”
about the three-year sentence Egyptian authorities handed down to a pro-democracy
blogger known for his pro-Israel views, JTA reported.

“We’re deeply
concerned and disappointed by his sentencing and, certainly, we call on the
Egyptian government to allow all Egyptian citizens the right to express their
universal rights,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner said on April 12,
referring to the sentence Maikel Nabil received for his reports on the military
government’s continued use of Mubarak-era methods of repression. “This is not
the kind of progress we’re looking for.”

Nabil, a pacifist, had been
charged with “insulting the military.” He is also known for his outspoken
pro-Israel views, a rarity in Egypt.

On Thursday, hundreds of
demonstrators gathered at the Israeli consulate in Alexandria to demand the
removal of Israel’s ambassador to Egypt and call for Egyptian support of the
Palestinians. Protesters held signs reading, “Gaza, my only love,” “Million of
martyrs are marching to Jerusalem” and “Here we come” – some of them written in
Hebrew.

Protesters called on all Egyptians to support Palestinians in
launching the “third intifada” on May 15, the day marked by Palestinians as
“Nakba Day” to mourn Israel’s founding.

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